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He likes walking just a bit behind her, watching her curls bounce as she walks. Fatima changes direction, taking him across the river and into some smaller streets. She is wearing a loose shirt that goes past her waist, over skinny jeans. The fabric of the shirt is sheer enough for his eye to make out her curves underneath, her hips shifting left and right with her strides. She is confident and doesn’t look back to check if he’s looking.
‘As you’re an artist,’ she says, ‘you should see the Centre Pompidou.’
He tells her about his sculptures, and how he likes the industrial look. His love for museums and old-fashioned stuff, twisting the old into something new. He has told her too much already. Can’t stop talking. He must seem like a blathering idiot. He stops when he sees a photo he wants to take – of more graffiti.
‘That one...’ she says. ‘The band broke up after the lead singer overdosed. Then this graffiti went up all over Paris with this stencil of the guy’s face with a mic. I think it was from his last concert.’ She traces her hand over the shape of the singer’s profile. ‘It’s so sad.’
She stops by a line of ripped posters of gigs. They are so old that graffiti is both below them and across them, making it into a wide mess of colour. ‘Do you like abstract pictures?’ she asks.
He takes close-up photos of the graffiti, the layers of weathered paper striped with paint and last year’s rain. Then he steps back to get her in some of the shots as well. She puts back on her aviation glasses. She purses her lips and puts her hands on her hips. He has to laugh – she has so much personality, the photos won’t do her justice. It could be a great series, like a stop-motion film. Fatima in the City, he’d call it.
‘Look out!’ she shouts, and pulls him towards her onto the pavement. He falls and hits his knee hard as a motorcycle zooms past, too close. His camera swings and smashes against his wrist.
‘Cretin!’ she yells at the driver, who ignores her as he turns a corner.
‘Are you okay?’ She kneels down and takes off the glasses, looking anxious. ‘He almost hit you!’
‘I’m alright,’ Bene says, rubbing his knee and shaking out his wrist. He inspects his camera, and is relieved to find it is still working.
She smiles wide. ‘I’m so glad. I would hate for you to be killed on your first night in Paris!’ She kisses him on the cheek, smelling of vanilla and something spicier. Then she moves back in front of the graffiti.
He pretends the kiss doesn’t mean anything. ‘That’s okay,’ he says. ‘I’m done with that shot.’
‘Well, if you say so.’ She takes him by the hand, the one not smarting from being smacked by the camera. ‘Pompidou is just around the corner.’
She leads him past small cafés, bakeries, stores catering to tourists. They pass an old umbrella shop, all the colours in the window bleached by the sun. It sells the ones with those old-fashioned handles with the heads of snakes and eagles and things. The place looks so dusty he can’t imagine anyone ever going inside. He takes a few photos of the animal-handles, then they walk on.
They see a hat store. It’s not like the umbrella shop. It’s caught up with the 21st century, selling all the latest knitted ones that skaters wear and the baseball styles for the American tourists. Some tacky magnets and things, Eiffel Tower keyrings, all for a few euros.
‘Look at this place,’ he says.
She looks at him strangely.
‘I want a hat,’ he pulls her inside.
‘What for?’ she asks.
‘I left one at home, this brimmed hat I liked.’ He really wants that hat back, so badly he would have paid fifty euros for it. The kind that shields you from the rain or the sun. You could wear it to keep the spotlights out of your eyes so you could concentrate when you got up in front of a crowd of thousands to play jazz on the world stage, your fans going wild. He tries to get Fatima to translate what he’s looking for.
‘Pas la saison,’ says the sales clerk, and Fatima shakes her head in agreement. It wasn’t the season for it, of course. A felted wool hat would sound ridiculous if you didn’t think of it the right way, like the guy on stage. But how could they not see that it’s not a winter thing, but a year-round master hat?
‘No problem,’ Bene says, trying not to show his disappointment.
––––––––
The art museum is as gorgeous as she said. Industrial pipes climb up the building, as if the outside finish is in retreat and the steel tubing is rising up in dominance. They conquer everything and turn your expectations inside out. He likes the colours, and the escalator running up the outside. Never seen anything like it.
He takes loads of photos from far away and zooming close. He’ll have a lot of fun playing with the colours and contrast later; now he just wants to catch it from every angle.
She sits on the pavement. It slopes downwards in a hill but it’s also a play area for kids and students. He wanders to take photographs, and feels her eyes following him. But when he looks back, she is texting on her phone.
A street artist draws a scene for the tourists of a very large map with continents and flags. You’re supposed to put your coins on the map where you’re from. Or maybe where you’re going, if you’re just passing through. Indecisive people can just toss the coin into a metal bowl placed where Paris would be on the map. Coins make a chi-chang sound as they land in the bowl. One guy misses and the coin rolls away, a kid chasing after it. The artist raises his head to watch, then nods as the boy puts it in the collection where it was intended.
Bene looks at the map, considers his options. He decides to place his coin on top of Kenya, where he’s heading. Makes as much sense as anywhere, really.
There is a children’s entertainer, painted face and all, surrounded by kids. He has this rope strip thing so he can make a line of large bubbles out of a solution in a bucket at his feet. The kids squeal and jump, trying to pop the bubbles even before they leave the rope formation.
‘This is great, so great,’ Bene says, sitting down beside her on the slope. He wishes he had more sophisticated words to say what he feels.
A woman sings a mournful tune in one corner of the courtyard. A man stands behind her, sitting on a stool with one foot higher than the other, playing a guitar, flamenco-style. She has an audience circled around her; they are entranced. Eyes all on her, there is none of the casual chatting on the sidelines.
‘That’s Fado,’ he tells Fatima.
‘No, it’s Arabic,’ she says.
‘It’s a Fado tune, I know it!’
‘It’s a traditional North African song. Maybe you Portuguese stole it.’ She gives him a look like he’s done something naughty. ‘Listen.’ She hums along with the woman, then adds words when it comes to a chorus. He can’t follow the meaning but doesn’t want it to stop.
‘What’s it mean?’
‘Oh, you know. Love, broken hearts, that sort of thing.’
‘No happy ending?’
‘It doesn’t really have an ending. It circles in on itself as long as the audience wants to listen.’
They watch in silence. The woman sings with her eyes closed, standing nearly motionless except for her lips. Her jawbone seems to be working hard, holding tight around the mournful notes. Her face is lined with tension, as if she is reliving a pain from long ago.
Somehow, the audience knows when it is about to end, and start to applaud as she holds a final note. The guitarist strums wildly like this is his last chance for fame. Then the woman’s posture relaxes, her eyes open and her face rises into a smile that almost looks like she doesn’t know who was just making all that sadness out loud. She places her hand on her heart and takes a bow.
‘The night is still young,’ Fatima says as the crowd starts to get up and move on. ‘Do you want to see some more music?’
He nods. He’d do anything for this girl. Got to make sure he doesn’t fall in over his head. He needs something, for courage. ‘How about a drink first?’ he says.
She looks at him. ‘How old are you?’
‘Eighteen,’ he lies. ‘Nineteen very soon.’
‘I know a place,’ she says.
––––––––
After flying down south again, Lena sat on her bed in the guesthouse in Goma with her laptop on her knees, her mosquito net draped above. She wanted to type up quick notes about the photos before the details escaped her. The impressions of the short trip to Bunia – the cars in the mud, the quiet determination of Abbé Augustin and the nuns, the peace chorale, the community water projects, the UN peacekeepers who seemed both under-staffed and inadequately equipped – how to turn these into a short report from the field? She’d never done this before, and tried to think the best way through.
The people, she convinced herself. Capture the stories about the people, and the projects and politics will come to matter because of the impact on people. She pounded out her thoughts on the laptop without much editing, hoping her language was taking the shape of an aid worker: professional, factual, descriptive, to the point.
She took a break for dinner. The guesthouse had a bar at the back, hanging with vines of bougainvillea, overlooking Lake Kivu. Gisenyi, a town in Rwanda, was just across the water. Points of light shimmered from lake-houses and docks. As the sun dropped, Rwanda got dark first, with night approaching from the east. A crescent moon perched above low mountains around the lake.
Earlier, the bar had a relaxed feeling, with soft music playing. People spoke quietly over beers, cold from the generator-powered fridge. She had been looking forward to hearing the band play, with the breeze from the lake cutting away the heat of the day.
Now, however, the place was packed, and the air was tense. Most of the crowd were young men, and many of them were in the military. They stood tall and confident, in clean pressed uniforms, with their shoulders back and berets on at an exact tilt. There was little banter or laughter. Guns were everywhere: some were resting on the bar, others were dangling off a strap, like a camera. Others were held ready, the soldier’s finger in position on the trigger.
She went up to the bar for a menu, then paused a moment. Who could she trust here? She caught a glimpse of the bartender and waited until he came near so she could ask him what was going on.
He looked around to see who was within listening distance before whispering: ‘It’s one of the VPs. From Kinshasa. He’s decided to stay here for the night. With entourage.’
‘One of the vice presidents? How many are there?’
He looked at her as if she really shouldn’t have asked. ‘Four, don’t you know? And they are all competing for power. They show off their wealth in soldiers. He’s taken over most of the rooms. If I were you, I’d find another place to stay.’
She looked around at all the armed men, trying not to show her alarm. She was by herself with no contingency plan, nowhere else to go. She took her chicken and rice to her room to eat, hoping to become invisible.
There was an old chest of drawers in the room. Made of dark lacquered wood, it was nearly as tall as she was. She leaned with all her weight and pushed it towards the door: her own personal barricade. If anyone tried to force their way in, at least there would be some resistance. There was a dark patch on the wall where the chest of drawers had been. She hoped no one had heard the screech of wood dragging on the floor. She didn’t want to raise any suspicion.
What was she doing here, a woman travelling alone, no experience in Congo, no background in this kind of thing? She could be anywhere. She should be anywhere else.
She looked out of the window, the colour of the sky darkening as the sun fell out of sight behind the hills. Lake Kivu was black and calm. According to the locals, underneath the depths were balls of sulphuric gas that could rise in a moment, although they seldom did. Perhaps life was precarious everywhere, but here it felt even more so.
She fell asleep in her clothes, sitting on the floor with her back against the chest of drawers.
––––––––
She heard a high alarmed ringing. She looked at her phone, but it wasn’t her ringtone. It said 2:08 am.
Many ringtones went off all at the same time. Some were urgent, piercing rings, others were less shrill. Some were a few recognisable notes from pop songs – Ricky Martin, Britney Spears, others she couldn’t name. They were all ringing at once, clashing and building into an uncontrolled racket.
Then there were footsteps — urgent, running footsteps, responding to commands. There was a muddle of male voices, some shouting, others in quiet agreement. The words were muffled through the walls but it seemed like some orders were being given, changes were happening at a pace. There were knocks on doors, sounds so close they made her jump. Doors opening, more orders drilled into someone. Shutting doors, more footsteps. More ringtones. More knocking.
Each time she heard a hand turn a doorknob she started. She prayed it wasn’t her door. Each time, miraculously, hers was overlooked.
––––––––
She awoke to the sound of birdsong over the lake. From her position on the floor she could see the sky out of the window – seemed to be just mist and a hint of the other shore in the distance. No signs of the commotion of the night.
Her neck was stiff from sleeping sitting up, and she rolled her shoulders back. Her hand tingled where she had been leaning on it. She shook both hands at the wrists as she stood up and tried to decide what to do. Had she imagined all the ringtones and footsteps?
She quickly packed up her clothes, notes, laptop and cameras. They fit into two small bags. With effort, she moved the chest of drawers back to its place. It was much heavier than she remembered.
She opened the door. In the hallway the smell of cigarettes hovered like a shadow and stubs littered the floor. Footprints muddied the linoleum, concentrated on the doorway next to her own. Maybe that was where the vice president had been staying.
Downstairs at the bar, there was almost no one, and not a machine gun in sight, thank God. The place was trampled and abandoned-looking. She saw the bar owner, nursing a morning cup. He gestured for her to help herself to the instant coffee.
‘What happened?’ she asked, spinning a spoon through Nescafé streaked with powdered milk.
His eyes were bloodshot, and he was wearing the same shirt as last night. It was missing the top two buttons and exposed a smooth chest. ‘The VP got a call in the middle of the night. The rebels took Goma airport for a time and his personal helicopter was set on fire. The rebels have cleared out now, but it showed that Goma is not safe under the government.’ He blew some air out in a rush. ‘It’s a bloody nose to him and to Kinshasa. He was really pissed about it. Didn’t pay his bill, the bastard.’
He looked up at her, as if he hadn’t thought about her until that moment. ‘What are you still doing here? Most of the internationals cleared out last night.’
‘I was just in my room.’
‘Usually you people have your security protocols to follow, no?’
She looked at her mobile phone. It didn’t always have reception, but it did now. Someone should have contacted her, shouldn’t they?
She had a quick breakfast and paid her bill. If all the other internationals had already left, did that make her a potential target? Ill informed, and left behind?
She walked out to the veranda, where the view of Lake Kivu was calm. She kept thinking about the ringtones for some reason, and the hands on the doorknob of the room next to her own. The mist was lifting off the surface of the water to reveal a layer with no hint of disturbance.
She rang Kojo’s number. Several rings went by before he picked up.
‘Morning,’ he said, voice rumbling as if he hadn’t yet spoken to anyone today.
The story came out in a rush – about the armed men in the hotel, the noises in the night, the chest of drawers, the reports of the rebels at the airport. Kojo listened carefully and repeated details back to her in summary, just to ensure that he understood.
‘Damnit, I was hoping you could get out of Congo without an incident. Your first mission as a regional rep, and this happens. Security should have rung you or left a message with the hotel. Stand by, I’ll ring you back. I’ll radio Bukavu and Kigali, to see if they know anything more.’
She hung up the phone. She had no way of calibrating her own sense of danger to the actual situation. She couldn’t go back into the hotel room and barricade herself in forever. She wondered what might have happened if she hadn’t had a strong set of drawers there and someone had tried to force their way into her room. She wouldn’t have had any real defence.
If the rebels took the airport, what other way was there to get home? And where was home, anyway? When she thought of joining Kojo, she thought of the villa they’d shared in Angola. But she was supposed to go to Nairobi after this, a place she’d never been.
The smell of last night’s chicken barbecue wafted up from the charred half-barrels below. She wondered what had been decided at yesterday’s party.
The mist was burning away. She could see more of the lake now. It was surrounded by low mountains, formed in layers descending towards the water. She would have loved to swim, but she knew that wasn’t allowed. Two elegant crested cranes skimmed and then landed on the water. Were they the type to mate for life, or just a season?
Kojo rang back. ‘With the airport attack, the security team assess that the risks are too high for you to stay on in Goma. And your mission was nearly concluded anyway. You know the main road in town? I think...’ She heard the rustling of a map on the other end. ‘That main road – Kigali Road... you need to walk that to the border, then go to Gisenyi, the first town on the Rwanda side. There you can take transport to Kigali.’
‘You want me to walk to Rwanda?’
‘It’s not far. Do you have your medical kit?’
‘Yep. And my passport and my letter from CWW with my laissez-passer.’ She hadn’t known why she needed a special letter that just asked for a generic permission to pass, but this seemed to be the right occasion.
‘Great. Keep that on your person at all times. Don’t let go of that, or your passport if you can help it.’
‘When should I go?’
‘Now. Call me as soon as you cross the border.’